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故弄玄虛

简故弄玄虚 · 繁故弄玄虛

Mandarin · pinyin gù nòng xuán xū

deliberately mystifying
to make sth unnecessarily complicated

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Characters in this entry

故: gù · ancient, old; reason, because
弄: nòng · do, play or fiddle with; alley
玄: xuán · deep, profound, abstruse; Kangxi radical 95
虛: Look up this written character
虚: xū · false

Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

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Mandarin tones

4–4–2–1 · gu4 nong4 xuan2 xu1

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Read this spelling in Classical texts

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故弄玄虛 · find source passages ↗ · 故弄玄虚 · find source passages ↗

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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 1 sense · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

gu3 lung6 jyun4 heoi1

Cantonese word readings for 故弄玄虛. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.

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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

Independent source senses for this spelling, with usage labels retained. Not matched to the pronunciation above.

phrase

(idiomatic) deliberately mystifying; to make something unnecessarily mysterious

Source page · dump 2026-09-02 · Contributors & history

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